Butte semi-weekly miner. [volume] (Butte, Mont.) 1886-1890, 1887-10-08
NA POPULAR ERROR .

POPULAR R i
MASSACHUSETTS, suPERFLuouswo-
MEN WIDOWS, NOT sPlNsTERs.
Notion Exploded by .
Careful statisticsl Investication-How
tne Dangerous Occupations Kin More
Men Than War-A Painful Case.
The great number Of recent railroad disas.
eers in New England and the facts that have
been made public by the discussion Of the re-
Gently enacted EMPLOYERS, liability law in
Massachusetts throw new light on the nra.
ponderance Of women in this state An in
v~estlgation of all the facts bearing on this
social phenomenon reveals a tragedy which
may be told in statistics. Who are these sur
plus womeni Unmarried womena So it has
oeen supposed, enormously.
1t has been assumed that thew were the nm.
married: the maidens and spinsters aleftn in
.oe struggle for matrimonial prizes, and
therefore presumably not the "fttest." But
IN investigation made shows that they are
neltner young maidens nor spinsters, but they
were. not long ago, the attest" the brightest
Oh tnelr sex, who early won the love and sur.
port OF brave young fellows, and are now
WIDOWS 1t takes very few figures to tell this
1act In the tragedy. The total excess of fe-
maies IN the state is 1888, and of this num-
Der oo,0o4, or more than IS per cent. are
WIDOWS, the total number Of widowed men in
the state being 32,154 and of widowed women
e7,15a
LUIS not among women Of advanced years,
or even among those in middle life, that the
great excess is found. More than half are
not yet 40, and 29:04 are of ages between 20
n ~. They had but tasted of the happi.
ness OF wifehood and motherhood when thew
were made "superaous." A great number Of
tnese women are the widows of the men whose
dreadful deaths by a thousand forms of mutt
iatlon We read OF in our newspapers night and
Haol!llng-the young wage earners killed in
the dangerous occupations.
The perils of Sher fisheries are a familiar
tale. Since earliest colonial days the coast
population has derived its support mainly
from the sea, and if the down east minister's
salary is no longer paid in cod and mackerel
by weight or count, it is none the less paid
with cod and mackerel in another a The
fisherman sees but little of his home, His
quest takes him $50 to 1000 or
more miles from Gloucester. He enters
tne little dory, and, casting off from the YES
sci, exposes himself to the full force of the
Atlantic. With the best Of luck, his suffer-
lngs are severe, and it is often that the worst
OF luck overtakes him. Lost in the fog, he
dies in the agonies of starvation and thirst.
and LAST seen on the Georges" is the only
word that gets back to the desolate home at
Gloucester. From 90 to 100 lives a wear are
lost from fishing vessels hailing from that
single port Of Gloucester. Last year the num-
Der was lis.
Not so concentrated in one locality and
occupation, but enormously greater in the
aggregate, is the loss Of life in the inland in
dustries. The network of railroads that
covers the state is the great minotaur. The
average number Of fatal accidents to railroad
employees during the ten Years, 1875 to 1856,
was al per year. The average number of
accidents not fatal was $50, and a large pro-
portion of these, it should be remembered,
result ultimately in premature death. The
average number of persons not employees
killed while walking or lying on the track
was V.9 per year. An analysis of the latter
number shows that the popular notion that
track walkers are usually drunken men or
tramps is as mistaken as popular notions in
general. The majority of them are laborers,
going to and from work by the railroad
track because it is more direct than the high
way.
lhe fatalities among men who meet death
while actually engaged in the duties of their
calling make up a painful record. Here is
one case from many in my note book. John
Gaylord was a freight brakeman. He was
zone of the boys" but a warm hearted fellow,
with plenty of good sense. Annie Day was q
comedy, affectionate girl, whose father was
an engineer on the same road. When John
was promoted to a regular post on tho plat
form of a passenger car Of a mixed train, and
told that il he kept straight he would be a
baggage master in a few months, he said lie
would keep straight and marry Annie. He
kept his word in both particulars; but the
railroad officers did not keep theirs. John
was still O. the platform of his passenger car
when there were three little Gaylords in
Armies neat kitchen. One day John was in
especially good spirits as he started of, and
he looked back and waved Ills dinner pail to
Annie and the three little faces in the door
way. The next day tho train had covered
two-thirds of the return trip when the signal
sounded for brakes. John sprang to his
post. The brakeman IN the freight car just
forward saw the passenger car topple to one
side, saw John straining at the brake, and
turned away his eyes. The passengers
crawled out, not one badly injured, and the
trainmen looked about for John. They
found him under the wreck, his Lands clutch
ing the broken brake-white, dead.
It was nearly tea time, and nearly time for
John, when Annie heard the newsboys cry
ing, LAST edition-all about the accident"
a familiar cry that always filled her with a
dreadful fear. In a moment she had the
paper. In the blur Of headlines that swan
before her eyes she saw only the words,
'John Gaylord. of this city, killed" Annie
is now one of the ''super]uous" women Of
Massachusetts,.
Now multiply this case of Annie Day by
almost the number of weeks in the year,
change the scenes and incidents in every
the tragedy of railroad employment in this
one little state so full of roads. Multiply by
more than the number of days in the year,
and remember the occupations of the fire
man, the miner. the quarryInan, the r%oofer,
the painter, the dyer, the grirder of cutlery,
and many more, and You begin to see the
extent OF this suffering ana truSGle IL !
rightly called a tragedy. It is no mere vul-
gar melodrama of sensational accident. 1t
is tho inevitable consequence of character.
Those manly traits that make actions strong
in defense, impel men also to face danger in
support of their families, and of tue exten-
sion and development of industry and trade.
Boston Cor. Cleveland Leader.
vecline in the Use of Flags.
The exhibition of 1851, that was to inaugu-
rate the new era of world peace, for the first
time introduced the flag i'll a new character:
Then began the tagging Of central avenues
and sida courts the ronhie for baZars.